9.30.06
updates: i finally finished the two jobs that were killing me. i now get a whole week "off". not. i'll be working in the office at the HCH this coming week. so's there's no painting on my schedule...just old people. come by, we'll do lunch.

kitty business: the kitty cat either ran away or was picked up by someone else. i'm thinking someone picked it up because it was hanging around the house quite loyally until poof, gone. it disappeared the day i was supposed to take it to the vet. convenient for me, huh? i had to call the vet's all, "hey, i've an appointment for 3pm...but the thing is...i can'tfindthegodamcatanywherei'msosorryi'musuallynotthisflaky. sorry!" i'm sure it happens all the time.
suuurrrrrre it does, jaimie.

the only bad thing is i think that my friends all think that i secretly took the kitty to the pound or to have it killed or whatnot. when i told them about it liz gave chris the look of "we should've taken the kitty. we knew jaimie would screw this up. she has a heart of stone. we knew this. we knew that her capacity to care for more than books and cartoons was nil. and yet, we left her in charge of a sweet kitty. we are fools."

and he returned her look with one that said, "the situation is highly regretable. it seems to me we had no choice but to trust in the Lord Almighty and if He saw fit to trust jaimie with a precious, starving kitten, who are we to question? although it makes one wonder just what in hell God was thinking."

which is strange because chris is usually pretty expressionless.

television update: he couldn't even wait a full week before having the cocking cable company over for coffee, snacks, and to install some kind of high definition mumbo-jumbo complete with a ti-faux thing that supposedly records shows i want to see. he tells me this only costs an extra $5 a month.

because i was born last night.

with no brain.

i've suppressed my rage into a mr. fleegan shaped tumor in my head (right next to the one shaped like a cellphone) because, "hey," i thought, "i can record Monty Python and not have to stay up after midnight to watch it. i can watch it WHEN. I. WANT."
RESULT!

how bad can this machine be?

so. what did it record?
well, it started recording in the mibble of Vicar of Dibley. yes, the MIDDLE. and then it stopped recording 5 minutes into Monty Python.

"jimmy. give me one reason why i shouldn't kill this damn thing right now. why? why do we need digital damn high def blah blah cork soaking cable in the bedroom where we can't even show the actual people we entertain in the actual room we entertain them in with this complete wonderful suckfest that is this shitball machine. one. one reason."

"look at the clarity on this. it's like we're there," he says.

"*sigh* do we at least get the National Geographic channel? BBC?"

"yeah."

"we do?!"

he scrolls through the channels.

"wait! is that....music channels?"

"yeah, they always throw it in; it's lame."

"showtunes. put it on showtunes!"

"they don't have showtunes on this..."

"45 damn digital radio stations? they sure as shit have showtunes."

"no they don-"

"ha! showtunes!"

"*groans* oh no."

that's right. force your expensive, nonnecessary televised techno-geekery on me will you? i'll make you suffer with showtunes and the beeb. have at you!

9.27.06
this job sucks. my back and shoulder are in hate with me at the moment. i should finish up this deck today so maybe that will  help although i won't get any days off between jobs, and that's a bummer.

***

my boss called the other day all worried and sad about a stray cat hanging around the HCH. so in a moment of weakness i told her i'd swing by and get the cat.

what?! this is karmic justice at it's finest. just ask liz.

so i brought it home in the jeep. then i called the Cat Whisperer, chris, and he came over and charmed the thing. it even took a crap in the litter box and covered it up. however, it has to be an outside kitty because i have an inside kitty, and toonces was none too pleased with the cute wittle beast.

so i fed it and it's been hanging around and i made a vet appointment for it (must! remove! gonads!) and now i can't find the gd shitbag. of all the stupid dumbhole things. i hate cats. especially cute, starving, extremely playful and sweet, stray shitbag kittens.

hell, i don't want another cat. at all. but i'd at least like to get that one fixed so's i know that whatever happens to it, who ever it does settle down with, i know it won't be having catfightsex. as uncle dan says, "sex makes babies." therefore catfightsex makes unwanted, feral, damn nuisance kittens.

i'm trying to be responsible!

***

florrie, i used my dutch oven on monday. i made your CHICKEN! CORN! CHOWDER! and everyone loved it, of course, because it's the best food on the planet. RESULT!

9.24.06
this morning i got to play with mr. finlayson's worship team. it was so much fun. i love getting to play bass. i STILL don't feel very comfortable with it, but i think it's just cos i know so many great bass players...well, one great bass player anyway...and i'm not even in the same ballpark. but still! fun!

***

jimmy did dishes today. i told him he gets Dude Points for that. he (with some help from dad) also managed to get our new 32 inch flat panel television set mounted to the wall. shut up.
i know.

i made the mistake of saying something stupid like, "look, if you're going to get a goddamn giant flat tv like on the commercials? then you've got to run the outlet and the cable behind it because i WILL NOT HAVE ugly cables hanging down the wall to the the cable thingy and the plug. they never show you that shit on the commercials, but you KNOW people buy those horrible things and then have ugly damn cables hanging down and i WILL NOT HAVE IT."

i figured that would keep him from getting one for a few months. holy shit was i wrong. because what he heard was, "if you fix it so's i don't see any cables by all means go and buy a giant honking plasma tv." so i get home one day and there's an outlet and a cable hook-up right in the middle of the wall.

lucky for me, plasma tvs are really big (we couldn't find one smaller than 37 inches, the hell?), and we didn't need a big tv for the bedroom. so much to jimmy's chagrin we got an LCD flat panel blah blah blah. we spent over an hour in Rex trying to figure out which one was the best, which one had the best picture quality, etc. finally i said, "jimmy, it's not like any of this matters...it's the tv in the bedroom. all we watch in there is cartoons. all this high res mumbojumbo won't even matter. as long as Peter's pants are green we're okay."

we decided, after my inner-jew popped up and said a few things, to get the one on sale because it was 7 inches bigger and $200 cheaper than the 26 inch ones. which made no sense to me. jimmy said it was because it didn't have good resolution. i said that i didn't care as long as it wasn't on sale because they break or something. cos if this tv breaks? heads are going to roll.

anyway, long, boring, sweaty story short:
we have a tv on the wall of our bedroom...just like on tv.

worst part:
i fucking love it.

9.20.06
i was raised on Sesame Street. perhaps you were as well? no? just kelly and i? okay then. KELLY OMG! DO YOU REMEMBER THIS? AND THEN WHEN HER LIPS SING BACK TO HER IN THE MIRROR, DIDN'T THAT USED TO FREAK YOU OUT? NO? JUST ME? WELL DAMN.

okay, so i was looking up old Sesame Street clips last night trying to find one where Madeline Kahn is singing with Grover (Sing After Me) so's to surprise kelly. jimmy was in the room and i kept saying, "oh! remember Billy Jo Jive?! super crime fighting ace?!"

"no."

"oh! remember the creepy guy who would paint numbers in weird places?! i totally forgot about that guy! awesome!"

"who?"

"hee! edith ann! "and that's the truth thbpbpbpb!""

"i remember her."

"oh check it! it's that typewriter guy! and his wheels squeak?"

"yeah, i vaguely remember that..."

now we both "nooneenooneenoo" when we walk around the house.

anyway. i love that stuff.

9.19.06
i'm still alive. i've just not had a chance to even turn the computer on much less check-a the e-mail and update this ol' blog.

we've had an electrician out to the house to update some of the outlets as NOTHING in this place is grounded. which doesn't bother me, but jimmy is all, "wah! my computer blah blah blah." so, new wiring.

PS: NEW WIRING IS A BIT COSTLY. and i'm just talking about the wire that's not including labor.

****

i'm standing as i type this because the computer chair is being used for something else. jimmy just walked by, rapid-fire spanked my bottom, said, "fanny patrol." and walked on.

the hell?

****

today i HANDWASHED three decks. as in, on my hands and knees scrubbing with a brush. i used Tide instead of bleach. and actually, it was not slippery. bleach on wood=slippery deathtrap. Tide on wood=freshly laundered deck. my back is killing me. my knees? not so bad, i used knee pads. RESULT!

****

mom and dad's new wikkle keekat is named Shenanigans. she's finally starting to come out from under the couch and play.

***

my new eyeglasses don't make me look like Harry Potter BUT NOT FOR THE EYEDOCTOR'S UNDERLING'S LACK OF TRYING. i told the lady, "i don't care about namebrand frames but the frames MUST NOT BE ROUNDY AND BLACK FOR I WILL LOOK LIKE HARRY POTTER."
she said, "okay." and proceeded to hand me pair after pair of round black framed glasses. the first pair she handed over i looked at her all, "um, obviously these are ROUND and also WITH THE HEAVY BLACK FRAME." but to humor her i put them on, looked in the mirror and said to her, "see? Harry Potter."

she laughed.

then handed me ANOTHER PAIR JUST LIKE THEM. i did the only thing i could, the only thing any normal person would do.
i killed her.

anyblah, the frames i got are kinda dorky in a '50s housefrau way, BUT NOT ROUND. EAT IT, BITCH.

***

my cell phone has bit the dust. it's turning itself off and doing random bullshit like that. it's driving me crazy. does anyone out there have one of the new motorolla PEBLs? are they worth it? are they bullshit i don't need? i saw one that was orange and that's why i wanted it. i know. so unlike me. "oooo pretty. i want it!" i'm usually more controlled than that. so anyway, if you call me and can't get me it's probably cos i lovingly placed my phone beneath the jeep's tire and backed over it.

9.13.06
i went to the eye doctor today. it was way past time for me to go. i'm sure we all remember the last time i went? hm? no? just me? fine. refresh your memories.

i'm not sure what it is about going to the eye doctor that turns me into a completely different person, but for some reason i do. i turn into a loquacious dork who fears pain (no wait, same person) and every other thing out of my mouth is, "i've notived that lately? when i'm working? my eyes start to- oh hey, whateryou doing? is this going to hurt?"

i went to a different eye doc today because the last one was...well, you read about it. it was stupid. this time? it was MUCH better. it was better because FIRST OF ALL they didn't dilate my pupils and THEN ask me to pick out frames. SECONDLY, the eye doc was really personable and she talked as much as i did. THIRDLY, she answered all my questions in ways that i could understand them, "well, basically, you have two eyes, and they're awesome." FORTHILY, she asked if i would paint her house. FILTHY, (hee) she seemed REALLY concerned when i told her that glaucoma runs on both sides of my family. so much so that she's sending me to a specialist.
"um, but aren't you...a specialist?"
"well, yes. but i don't have the $40,000 machine that the other guy has."
"ah."
"yeah."
that is HONESTY, people.

plus she was like, magic.
at one point she was all, "a or b? 1 or 2? a or 2? ah, the computer suggested your left eye was weaker."
what computer? i didn't...you didn't...what?

and then she was looking into my eyes with a laser beam that shoots liquid hell light beams straight into the sensitive light hole in my eye and she says, "do you have allergies?"
"hm? me? no, never. i've never been allergic to things."
"well, your eyes have allergies in them right now."
"oh, well actually...my eyes have been itching like crazy the last two days."
"...and you don't have allergies?"
"well, i've...actually, i've never thought about it before."
"you don't think itchy eyes-"
"i mean, i don't have ALLERGIES like where my world is ending because i'm ALLERGIC to natural air and i have to shoot spray liquid up my nose and use an inhaler to breathe for me and oh god whoa is me is that GRASS and TREES? GOD HATES ME kind of allergies."
"..."
"oh hell, do you have those allergies?"
"no! no, but i know those people."
"yeah me too, poor bastards."
"but your eyes are itchy and that's not good."
"well, honestly they itch a lot but i think it's cos i paint. i'm in a different environment all the time and my eyes feel gunky and itchy at the end of the day."
she gave me some eyedrops. RESULT!

i am a little anxious about the specialist eye exam, but i've talked with my other leetle brahther, PJ, who works for an ophthomologist in ohio and he explained what tests they would probably do and it doesn't sound too bad. until he got to the part about vegetable dye. he was all, "they get a needle and inject vegetable dye-"
"what?! a needle?!"
"yeah and then-"
"a needle in MY EYE?!"
"no! they inject it in your arm and the dye somehow gets to your eye."
"oh really?"
"yeah."
"so no needle in my eye?"
"no!"
"okay, well a needle in the arm i can handle."

totally.  needle in the arm? nothing. no. thing.
but try to put a couple of drops in my eye? i become a whiny, pain-feeling baby, like those poor allergy freaks.

9.12.06
wow, i've really been slacking in my postings, huh? well, gimmie a break. i'm married now. i'm doing a lot of what newlywed womens do at the beginning of their marriage:

i'm learning how to live with a dude while trying not to  
A. lose my mind or
B. commit murder.

i know he wasn't raised in Russia by wolves and/or potatoes because i've actually met his family, multiple times, and he doesn't have a heavy Russian accent. but his "laundry proceedure" is absolutely uncipherable. aside from the fact that he folds up his DIRTY socks to look JUST LIKE the clean ones, ("are these socks dirty?"
"um, where were they?"
"rolled up together by the bed."
"on the floor?"
"yes."
"then yes, they're dirty."
"HOW DO YOU KNOW? THEY LOOK LIKE THE CLEAN ONES ON THE DRESSER!"
"but they were on the floor.") there's the thing where he hangs his dirty t-shirts on hangers. what? but why?
"didn't you wear this shirt yesterday?"
"which one is it?"
"the spam one."
"oh yeah!"
"well, what's it doing on a hanger? are you going to wear it again?"
"no, it's dirty."
"...on a hanger?"
"but it's hanging in the bathroom."
"and that equals dirty?"
"sometimes."

and that's when my brain explodes.

there are currently three pair of shorts, two pair of boxers, and some briefs slung on a rod in the bathroom/laundryroom. i have NO IDEA what is dirty and/or what is still wearable BECAUSE THEY ARE ALL FOLDED UP, but i know, KNOW, that they aren't all clean because he hasn't washed any clothes. and what is killing me is that it's not like i hide the goddamn laundry basket. it's right there. on the floor. next to his rolled up socks which may or may not be dirty.

and don't hear that i'm bitching that he doesn't do laundry, i'm not. trust me, i'm not an idiot. he was raised in the south. the southern mamas don't let their baby boys do laundry. oh no. only communist hags expect men to help with things like laundry and dish washing.
and i don't actually mind doing laundry (STOP! COLLABORATE AND LISTEN! I DO NOT IRON ANYTHING. I DON'T EVEN OWN AN IRON. AND DO NOT BUY ME ONE.) but what i do mind is having to THINK about laundry "is this clean? did he wear this? i know he has underwear...but where IS IT?"

aside from separating lights from darks...i don't want to have to solve laundry puzzles, and the Dirty Laundry Egg Hunt is shenanigans that i don't play.

IT PUTS THE LAUNDRY IN THE BASKET!

and yes, i realize that i've lived by myself for a while and i need to chillax while i learn to adjust living with this CAVEMAN FROM THE MOON.

9.09.06
fiddy.

mom and dad have a new kitty cat (keekat)! she doesn't have a name yet. she's a black keekat. she kinda sucks so far because she won't come out and play. she just hides all day.

on cat names:

It's an interesting fact that fewer than 17 % of Real cats end their lives with the same name they started with. Much family effort goes into selecting one at the start ("She looks like a Winnifred to me"), and the as the years roll by it suddenly finds itself being called Meepo or Ratbag.

- Terry Pratchett, The Unadulterated Cat

9.06.06
today is leetle brahther's birthday. he's 26.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEETLE BRAHTHER!

***

i bought some flea spray for Rox (rawlks, hee) and it's called Sentry Natural Defense. i just wanted something that would help with the flea drops that we put on her skin because while those work for a while...they don't actually work for a whole month (in my experience) and i hate to see the poor girl scratch. so i got that special organic "natural" voodoo kind thinking, "meh. it won't work but whatever." well, it actually works. i've noticed a big difference. and bonus? it smells good. i guess it should, it's peppermint, cinnamon, lemongrass, thyme, and clove oils. it's a bit strong but at least it doesn't smell like chemical poison. i figured with all those flavors she would draw ants...but so far so good.

she hates it, but she's not scratching. i'm not sure if she's putting two and two together.

***

you should go to laura's site and checkout the fleegan desktop and the sweet wedding fleegans! she's so clever sometimes it's actually painful.

9.04.06
it's true. we are now mr. and mrs. fleegan! i'm an old married hag now.

i can only assume that hell is in the process of freezing over and that the four horsemen are saddling up their death steeds to bring along the apocalypse. i hope you've been stocking up water supplies and have your escape plan ready.

*** 

we stayed at this fancy hotel in chattanooga called the Read House. it was tres glammy fancy. when we got to the room the porter guy was unloading our bags from the rolly cart and he set down mr. fleegan's toiletries bag a little too hard and something started buzzing.

"is that your cell phone?" i asked.

"no. i don't-"

"what the hell? what is that? is that in your bag?"

the porter looked uncomfortable as he stood there waiting for his tip that jimmy was getting out of his wallet as i continued to wonder about the sound.

"geez, that's loud what is that? IS THAT A VIBRATOR?!"

the porter took his money and ran.

"no, i think it's my electric shaver. the button must've been hit on something."

"oh. hee! that dude totally has a story now!"

"wow. and we've only been here five minutes."

***

"hey, i just heard that the Crocodile Hunter died."

"no kidding?"

"nope. you wanna guess how?"

"i'm gonna go out on a limb here and say...crocodile?"

"nope. stingray."

"no shit? that's odd."

"yep."

"does that count as "natural" causes?"

"that's cold."

"two words buddy: snack cracker."